A journey among Zimbabwe’s fragile Hwange elephants
Along with a supporting cast of fellow Big 5 members — cheetahs, rare African painted wild dogs and more than 400 species of birds — they inhabit Africa’s 10th-largest park, an exceptionally diverse landscape of teak and miombo forests, false mopane woodlands and vast grassy savannas.
For “tusker” lovers, this enormous wildlife sanctuary half the size of Belgium is the place to be during the May-to-November dry season, when tens of thousands of elephants congregate around its waterholes.
On a continent where many pachyderm populations are being decimated to feed Asia’s lust for ivory, such a huge concentration of elephants in a single park appears initially encouraging.
A healthy elephant spends around 16 hours a day eating up to 600 pounds of leaves, grass and shrubs.
Probably nobody knows Hwange and its elephants better than Mark Butcher, a native “Zimbo” who worked with Zimbabwe’s Forest Commission in the early ’80s and spent decades as a game warden here before opening his own safari company, Imvelo Safari Lodges.
In his khaki shorts and broad-brimmed safari hat, Winchester Magnum .458 rifle slung over one shoulder, this weathered and wiry man reminds me of one of Hemingway’s “Snows of Kilimanjaro” characters.
Hwange is a ticking ecological time bomb, Butcher explains, with far more elephants than its natural carrying capacity can sustain.
Containing no major rivers or lakes and precious little natural ground water, especially during its harsh dry season, the proposed zone along Zimbabwe’s western frontier with Botswana was a poor choice for a national park.
[...] letting nature take its course by simply shutting off the water supply, as some experts have recommended, would lead to mass death.
The practical side of this “safari” offers insight into Hwange’s water supply situation and hands-on experience helping conserve and protect the elephants.
“These guys from the local villages, they’re Hwange’s true unsung heroes,” he says, explaining that they volunteer to live alone, far from their homes for months on end, maintaining the pumps, always on the lookout for poachers.
There are still remote parts of Hwange that hark back to an earlier, more rugged era of safaris before rose-petal baths, complicated dietary restrictions and in-room Wi-Fi.
Named for a nearby ranger station abandoned for decades, this small cluster of spacious canvas tents on elevated teak platforms overlooks a seasonal waterhole.
Surrounded by wind-blown fossil sand dunes and Zambezi teak forests, where ancient elephant migration paths serve as roads and animals are still unaccustomed to seeing humans, Jozibanini is still untamed and until recently, unprotected.
“We wanted to reestablish a permanent presence in this neglected area after the 2013 Jozibanini poaching incident here,” Butcher explains as we sip whiskey around the fire pit at our last pump-run stop of the day.
“Places like Jozibanini are on the front line of the war against poaching,” he adds emphatically, suggesting that tourists who venture out here also can play a role as eyes and ears against the enemy.
Jozibanini’s waterhole is flowing again, thanks to a recently installed pump, and the animals are starting to return, led by skittish herds of elephants that still prefer to drink by night, out of sight of these funny-smelling, two-legged newcomers.
On a two-hour “tour de bush” mountain-bike ride along miles of elephant paths with Butcher the next morning, I spot fresh lion, hyena and wild dog tracks — an encouraging sign in this freshly reclaimed part of Hwange.
[...] it isn’t all about me going to the elephants.
The lodge’s seven “thatched chalets” overlook a popular waterhole and swimming pool frequented by large numbers of elephants and other game.
The company offers visits to local schools and villages, as well as tours on the Elephant Express, a 24-seat bus that makes scenic trips from a hub near Hwange Main Camp to Imvelo lodges in the southeast corner of the park.